


Ceiling Fans and Idle Hands

by marsakat



Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Angst, Depression, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-02
Updated: 2016-08-02
Packaged: 2018-07-28 22:30:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,951
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7659340
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marsakat/pseuds/marsakat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When he closed his eyes, all he saw was blue of anoxia.  He didn't expect recovery to only make it worse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ceiling Fans and Idle Hands

**Author's Note:**

  * For [troubledsouls](https://archiveofourown.org/users/troubledsouls/gifts).



> major tw for suicide attempt, and depressive/self-harm thoughts.  
> This is a birthday present for minecraftwarcat!!! He wanted angst, so here y'all go

He rocked back and forth on the hard plastic chair of the waiting room, the clock ticking mercilessly in the quiet space.  The hustle and bustle of the hospital was a world away on the other side of the closed door, but the man was prisoner to his own worries, unable to watch the muted television in the corner.  He was living the worst day of his life; every time his eyes shut for more than a blink, the seared image of what he’d come across—what he’d stopped—was burned into his eyelids.

Walking into that hotel room, seeing his best friend dangling from the ceiling—toes barely brushing the floor, eyes closed, and he’d worried that it was too late.  Dead.  He didn’t know whether or not he yelled, he must have, if the other people rushing in to help were any indication.  But it was in short heartbeats before then, where he was alone in lifting the body that was thankfully not cold—removing the noose and lowering him to the floor.

He pressed his mouth to blue lips, breathing in life.  His fingers found a weak pulse in the neck where the skin was already mottled from the rope.  There was a chance at least, and he begged the unresponsive figure to try to live for him.  The first signs of life were retching and vomiting as hands dragged him back so the EMTs could work.

They didn’t let him ride in the ambulance, but he followed close behind with their friends and crew members.  Alternating between sobbing and raging, he pushed hands off of him, not wanting to be touched.  The others were despairing, suffering in their own way, but his breathing was ragged, shaking uncontrollably.  He’d never come so close to losing everything that was so important to him, never lost control like this.  It was all falling apart.  He had the most to lose.

It only took one glance at Tyler on the stretcher, surrounded by doctors as they forced a tube down his throat to connect a machine to breathe for him that sent Josh crumbling to the floor.  His anguished yells brought curious faces poking from behind curtains as security guards rushed to stop this disturbance.  They brought him here to this quiet room for him to have his panic attack out of the way of the people trying to work. 

“Josh—you okay now? They say he’s stable enough that we can go see him.”

Tyler was asleep, or at least that’s how he looked with full eyelashes fluttering occasionally, but never opening.  Josh held his hand all the way from the ER to the ICU, the nurses having to work around him, because if he let go for too long, the fear of losing him grew too acute to handle. 

The bruises on Tyler’s neck darkened to mark where the rope had pulled.  Josh watched his throat with sick fascination.  Josh couldn’t eat, he couldn’t sleep, he could barely talk when people tried to engage him in conversation.  He didn’t want to miss a moment as Tyler’s eyes opened a couple times—bloodshot and unseeing.  Each time, Josh’s heart would race and he’d call out Tyler’s name, but with no response.

They dragged him away after a few days, when Josh actually collapsed with exhaustion as he stood to get his hundredth cup of coffee.  They brought him to a new hotel, not the one where _it_ happened, where he found Tyler.  Josh wondered if they drugged him to sleep for seventeen hours straight, or was his body so worn, mind in need of escape, that he slept undisturbed for almost a day.  He woke up to the hum of a vacuum in a different room, too exhausted to turn his head from the ceiling fan. A cough nearby startled him to find Mark sitting in an armchair, on his phone and unaware Josh was no longer sleeping.

Josh wondered if they’d arranged to have people watch him make sure he didn’t hurt himself, too.  He thought about it briefly—the craving to feel something besides loss, to see red as opposed to the blue skin and lips he saw when he closed his eyes.  He wanted what he felt on the inside to mark the exterior, but decided he was too exhausted to carry out any of these thoughts.

“Wha’ time is it?” his mouth was dry, words sticking to the inside of his cheeks.

“Time for you to eat and shower.”

“How’s Tyler?”

“Awake,” and Mark smiled for the first time since a leash became a noose again.

Josh didn’t know how to process this information.  That’s a good thing, he had to remind himself.  Awake means alive.  Means brain functioning.  But it’s only the start of the recovery process.  Tyler has a long way to go with healing; not only his body (and Josh tried not to think about what hanging himself would do to Tyler’s voice), but the source of all this pain—Tyler’s mind.  Surviving this attempt means there’s always a risk for more.  Tyler may try and try again, and what if Josh isn’t there to stop it?  He starts sobbing helplessly, and Mark runs to hold him, whispering promises that they’ll make it through, though Josh doesn’t believe him.

…

He was terrified to see what state Tyler would be in.  Would he be ashamed of himself?  Would he cry?  Would Tyler pretend it was all an accident, a misunderstanding, a mistake; brushing off all the suffering he put them through?  A little part of Josh, a selfish part he didn’t want to acknowledge, hoped Tyler would be grateful. 

Mark watched him closely throughout the meal Josh barely ate, in the car ride to the hospital, confused by Josh’s lack of excitement or even a smile at the knowledge his best friend was doing better.  Maybe this had broken him so completely that even tangible improvements couldn’t change how broken he was.  Mark prayed Josh wouldn’t be trapped in this forever—if there was anyone who deserved better, it would be him.

Josh did smile when they walked into Tyler’s hospital room—a small one that seemed to stretch sore tendons painfully as he saw the singer watching him with eyes red from the strain of strangulation.  The smile faded as Tyler’s face remained stony.  He answered Mark’s questions with a hoarse voice casually, as if he wasn’t ignoring Josh, whose face was growing increasingly distressed at this cold shoulder.  Mark figured maybe the two needed time alone, and he went to get coffee, leaving them in awkward silence.

“Hey, man.  I’m glad you’re… doing better,” Josh shuffled his feet.  Tyler snorted and rubbed his neck, avoiding eye contact.  Josh was still standing, the unwelcoming vibes coming from his friend—like he was a cornered animal ready to bite—kept Josh from coming closer.

“Tyler, I—”

“Oh just shut up, Josh.  I know you’re the one who stopped me.  And what did you want? Me to say ‘wow thanks so much for saving my life!” well I’m not happy about it.”

“I wasn’t just going to let you die!” Josh said quietly.

“That’s what I want!  I wanted it to end, I wanted it to be over.  I’m suffering every day I’m alive and I was finally going to have peace and you fucking screwed it up,” Tyler shouted at Josh, who flinched like he’d been stabbed.  Tyler never cursed, and especially not _at_ him.  Tyler rarely got mad at him, never yelled at him before.  Josh had thought he’d lost everything a few days before, but this only showed there was still more of his world to crumble away.

“You’re so fucking selfish, get the hell out of here,” Tyler threw a water pitcher at Josh and it exploded on the wall with a loud crash.  Josh tripped on his way out the door, banging his knee hard on the tiles before sprinting as fast as he could away from another nightmare.  He ran out of the hospital and into the streets with no one stopping him.  Circling block after block for an unknown amount of time, alternating quickly between numbness, and hyperventilating.  Josh was in blackout, only startling to awareness as a stranger yanked him away from walking into traffic, the car horns an alarm.

“What the hell are you doing? Do you need help?” The stranger shouted, and Josh cowered.

“No—no please.  I didn’t mean to! Please let me go,” he pulled himself free and sprinted away again.  He was so very lost in this city he didn’t know, and Josh never wanted to be found again.  He wanted to break open on the sidewalk, he wanted to disappear—but he couldn’t do that.  He couldn’t put his family, his friends, Tyler—no Tyler wouldn’t care if he died—through that.  Josh nearly abandoned his phone, but the shrill, constant ringing of his panicked friends finally had him answering.

“Josh—Josh! Where are you?” Mark pled, clearly afraid he had tried to hurt himself too.  Josh didn’t know but somehow Michael was able to find him.  Cursing Tyler’s explosive anger all while trying to comfort Josh, Michael couldn’t help him.  Josh was sinking, sunk, gone. 

…

Tyler went into psychiatric treatment, while Josh continued to dissolve, alone and at home.  He barely slept, barely ate, only answering his mother’s phone calls when she’d check to make sure he was still alive.  He’d lie or minimize his daily inertia, knowing if anyone saw him they’d see he was in crisis.

Maybe he should’ve locked the doors, but honestly Josh couldn’t care less if someone walked in and murdered him.  He spent days staring at the ceiling, mind cycling endlessly through calling himself worthless, through laughing at how pathetic he was for falling apart because of one person.  It wasn’t worth ruining his life over Tyler’s anger, but rational thoughts mean nothing to a depressive state.

“Oh God.  Josh,” Tyler’s voice felt not real, as he appeared in the room one day, having used the unlocked doors to find his friend catatonic and motionless.  “I’m…I’m so sorry.” 

Josh could barely find the strength to blink, let alone lift a hand to touch the person sitting on the bed next to him.  

“I screwed up so bad,” Tyler started, breathing heavily through the emotions of seeing how much he’d destroyed another person, especially one he cared so much about.  He’d had many epiphanies since they last time they saw each other—realizations about how his actions and words affected other people.  He was in a better place now, though this was going to be one of the hardest things of his recovery.  “I was in so deep that I thought—everyone would be better without me.  I just didn’t want to fight anymore, so to wake up after I thought I was successful—it was the worst feeling.  And I put that all on you.  I tried to drown you with every bad thing I felt.  And I’m sorry, though that feels like a hollow thing to say.”

“I love you, Josh.  And I’m glad I got another chance to tell you that,” Josh lifted his head enough to see Tyler wiping away tears.  “I hope you will one day forgive me.”

“I do,” Josh spoke for the first time in weeks words that weren’t sobs or solitary yells of anger.

And it wasn’t fixed that instant.  There was so much broken between them, but they were willing to try.  So they lay next to each other, with just the fact the other was breathing as comfort enough for the both of them

**Author's Note:**

> prompt me @ teeentyonepilots


End file.
